[Air-L] IM interviews not interviews?

[Jenny Davis]

Hi Alex,

I am writing for Sociology. I'm aware of several articles that defend the use of Instant Message, and several that point out the weaknesses, but haven't been able to find one that says they are categorically NOT interviews. 

Here are some citations I use in the paper:

Traverse, Max. New methods, old problems: A sceptical view of innovation in qualitative research. Qualitative Research. 9:161 
 
Enochsson, Ann-Britt. 2011. “Who Benefits from Synchronous Online Communication?: A Comparison of Face-to-Face and Synchronous Online Interviews with Children.” Procedia-Social and Behavioral Sciences: 15-22

Markham, Annette N. 2013. Remix Culture, Remix Methods: Reframing Qualitative Inquiry for Social Media Contexts. In Denzin, N., & Giardina, M (Eds.). Global Dimensions of Qualitative Inquiry. Left Coast Press. 

Hesse-Biber, Sharlene and Amy J. Griffin. 2013. “ Internet-Mediated Technologies and Mixed Methods Research: Problems and Prospects. “ Journal of Mixed Methods Research 7(1):43-61.

Beneito-Montagut, Roser. 2011. “Ethnography Goes Online: Towards a User-Centered Methodology to Research Interpersonal Communication on the Internet.” Qualitative Research 11(6):716-735

I could certainly also include some older stuff (like Hine's virtual ethnography or Miller and Slater's book), but I the more recent stuff pretty much subsumes those texts. 

Thanks!!

Jenny



----- Original Message -----
From: "Alex Leavitt" <alexleavitt at gmail.com>
To: "Jenny Davis" <jdavis4 at neo.tamu.edu>
Cc: "AoIR-L" <air-l at listserv.aoir.org>
Sent: Sunday, August 18, 2013 1:03:17 PM
Subject: Re: [Air-L] IM interviews not interviews?



It'd be helpful to know 1) what you've cited so far in defense of them, and 2) what disciplinary audience you're working with (eg., anthropology journal reviewers would react to IM interviews different from psychology journal reviewers). 

There are a number of papers that pop up from a simple Google search – https://www.google.com/search?q=instant+message+interviews+method – that seem to agree that IM really isn't that different, though it'd seem adequate to map out the area and cite a fair amount of people in a few sentences as justification. 




Alexander Leavitt 
PhD Student 
USC Annenberg School for Communication & Journalism 
http://alexleavitt.com 
Twitter: @alexleavitt 




On Sun, Aug 18, 2013 at 6:46 AM, Jenny Davis < jdavis4 at neo.tamu.edu > wrote: 


Hi all, 

Long time lurker and responder, first time inquirer. 

I am working on an R&R for a paper in which I use both FtF and IM interviews. I am aware of the literature that talks about the strengths and weaknesses of IM as an interview mode, but one of the reviewers says that IM does not constitute an interview at all, but merely a question/answer session. I want to address this critique adequately. Is anyone familiar with specific articles/books that make this argument and/or push back against it? 


Thanks!! 

Jenny L. Davis 
Assistant Professor 
Department of Sociology & Anthropology 
James Madison University 

email: Davis5JL at jmu.edu 
Twitter: Jenny_L_Davis 
Blog: Cyborgology.org 
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